The DeVory Darkins Show - Dinesh D'Souza issues CRITICAL WARNING About America’s Future

Episode Date: March 30, 2026

Dinesh D'Souza issues CRITICAL WARNING About America’s Future. This comes after Congress continues to fail the American People. Dinesh speaks about his current documentary Dragon's Prophecy and is reflection on the 2020 election.FOLLOW Dinesh D'SouzaSubstack: https://t.co/e9jgDYkZ6cYoutube: https://t.co/9pvC7J918Shttps://x.com/DineshDSouzaJOIN ME AD-FREE HERE:https://darkinsplus.comFOLLOW ME:https://www.twitter.com/devorydarkinshttps://www.instagram.com/devorydarkinshttps://www.rumble.com/c/devorydarkinshttps://devory.wtf.tvBUY ME A COFFEE:https://buymeacoffee.com/devorydarkinsSHOP OUR MERCH STORE:https://store.devorydarkins.comADVERTISING INQUIRIES:[e-mail]/SUPPORT INQUIRIES:[e-mail]

After 19 years, they're back. Frankie Munes, Brian Cranston, and the rest of the family reunite in Malcolm in the middle, life's still unfair. After 10 years avoiding them, how and lowest demand Malcolm be at their anniversary party, pulling him straight back into their chaos. Malcolm in the middle, life's still unfair. A special four-part event, streaming April 10th on Hulu on Disney Plus. All right, guys, welcome back to the DeVorey Darken show, special guests here virtually with us. Dinesh D'Souza, which I,

would argue as an individual who started as a commentator and has created a couple of films here in our recent past that I believe is shaping millions of Americans out there and how they see politics. So I'm so grateful to have him here in the studio, hear his story, and I want to welcome you. Thank you for joining us here. Hey, it's my pleasure. Thanks for having me on. Yeah, absolutely. My first question right out of the gate for you is, when did you know that you had the level of influence that you have today? Because I know there's a couple of documentaries. I want to get to the recent one that you just came out with. But when was that epiphany for you?

Well, my career has gone in two phases. In the first phase, I was more of a think tank guy at these research foundations like the American Enterprise. Institute, the Hoover Institution. I was writing, you know, books that were often getting a lot of attention, best-selling books, but nevertheless, I was in the sort of intellectual precinct of conservatism and reaching a more like narrow or focused audience. I mean, it's probably tens of thousands of people, but not hundreds of thousands and not millions. About 12 years ago, I started making documentary films, mainly with the idea of trying to reach a wider audience. and also use the powerful kind of visual medium of film.

And that took me to a whole new level. It pulled me outside of the conservative sort of intellectual orbit. And now my films, you know, I would stand in the back of the theater and I'd see like, you know, a Hispanic guy with his wife and four kids in the theater. And I would realize, you know, I'd never see that guy in a line at Barnes & Noble to, you know, get his book signed. So it's a different audience, and I've discovered through these films, which I've now done about eight or nine of them, they do reach a wider audience. And they also do something else, which is that they appeal to the head and the heart.

Books are, because they're an intellectual project, you know, they appeal to the mind. But they don't have that kind of emotional appeal that a film does, you know, using the techniques of film, which include music and cinematical. The combined impact is really powerful, and therefore I'm really happy to straddle these two very different genres. I still do the books, but I typically now do them in conjunction with the film. Yeah. I love that the way that you shared that. Let me ask you, where does your last name come from? I've never heard of it.

My last name is actually Portuguese. DeSuzza is not uncommon Portuguese name. The Portuguese case. to India in the 16th century, right about the time, little after the time Columbus came to America, and the Portuguese established some colonies in India, including a place called Goa. My family is from Goa, which means that my ancestors, again, hundreds of years ago, converted to Christianity. Now, when they did that, they typically took a Christian name, but since the only Christians they knew were the Portuguese, it ended up being Portuguese names. So my first name, Dinesh, is

very Indian, but my last name Desuza is Portuguese. I don't have any Portuguese ancestry, but it is a reflection of my ancestors converting to Christianity in the era of the Portuguese. Yeah. I think one thing we have in common, just so you

understand, is no one has our names. I don't think there's another Janus DeSuzza on the planet. Well, that's why it is funny. You know, when I was younger, one of my friends, in fact, this was one of my college roommates. I was writing articles and he's like, man, Dinesh is such a weird name.

He goes, you need to use your middle name. My middle name, by the way, is Joseph. So he's like, you need to go by Joe, Joe or Joseph D'Souza. But I didn't do that. And as it turns out, it was the right decision because, as you say, our names are distinctive. A lot of times in an airport, I'll just hear Dinesh. I know it's me. Some guys are yelling out to me, probably because he's seen a film of mine.

And so Dinesh is a more memorable name, certainly, than Joe. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I love that. All right. So the Dragon Prophecy, new documentary. I really want to hear more about it. But could you just tell us what is the purpose for that film? Well, this latest film is different than my earlier films, which are all in one way or another about the meaning of America. I've done films on Obama, on Hillary Clinton, a film on the 2020 election, 2,000 Mules. But in this film, it's about the intersection of politics and the Bible. It's about Israel. It's about Hamas, radical Islam. But it's also about the connection between war and spirituality. So this is a bit of new territory for me. The film is based upon a book of that title by a guy named Jonathan Khan.

and what he does is a very novel, I think quite brilliant sort of scriptural analysis of what's going on in the Middle East. And I added to that in the film, this is not in his book, a segment on biblical archaeology, because I said to myself, you know, I'm going to have secular viewers and they're going to be like, this biblical stuff is really interesting. But how do we know that the people and events of the Bible are real? How do we know that this isn't just some sort of mythology, some sort of fiction, a literary fiction, perhaps, and so the archaeology is there to validate and authenticate the people and events of the Bible. So it's an ambitious project, but when I'm very excited about it, happens to be simultaneously timely and yet timeless. Yeah, I would definitely say timely for sure. I have to pick your brain on this particular point. Politics and religion, particularly in our country, what is your mindset around that?

believe they belong in the same sentence? Do you believe they compliment each other, or do you think they're at odds? I think that religion has a wider scope than politics. It covers things that go beyond the reach of politics. So if you look at the Bible, for example, it has theology, it has the miracles, it has the account of creation, it has a prophetic forecast of the vision for the end of the world. So all of that is outside the scope of certainly day-to-day politics. In the other hand, the Bible has also some recipes for how human beings should live together. It has some moral commandments that are ways for us to live individually, but also collectively. It details rights and responsibilities, at least in a kind of ancient form. And so it has a lot of material

quite relevant. And by the way, this is what understood through American history. The founders, for example, drew heavily on the Bible. You know, slaves in the 18th century and the 19th century would draw, for example, on the book of Exodus

to see in it a kind of story of liberation that was relevant to their own experience. And so politics overlaps with the Bible while simultaneously going, religion goes, covers topics that go beyond politics. Yeah. Yeah. And so having said that, do you believe maybe people misunderstand that in our society? The reason why I'm asking is because I've been witnessing over the past couple of years how sometimes they're at odds, for example, the Democrat Party. I don't believe any policy they push forth is in alignment with any of these biblical principles that we've learned as Christians. So give me your thoughts about that. There are things that are immoral that are not illegal.

And so the fact that something is wrong doesn't by itself mean it should be outlawed. So, for example, one should treat other people well. That's the kind of moral principle. You should do unto others as you would have them do unto you. but we don't have a law that says that. The laws focus generally on a more narrow scope of things that harm other people or infringe on their rights. And so what politics is trying to do is to encompass some but not all of morality. And so this is important to keep in mind because there are people who sometimes treat the Bible

as a kind of recipe book for the moral laws of a society. And I agree that our society is based on biblical principles. But it's also the case that a number of these biblical precepts do not belong in the governmental sector, but kind of in the private sector. A really good example. I don't know if you've heard about this guy. Well, he's in Texas where we both are. James Tala Rico.

Oh, the Bible demands we provide health care for all. the Bible demands this. Well, the Bible speaks about these principles, but you get no indication anywhere in the Bible, and certainly not from Jesus, that these are governmental tasks that should be imposed on people and extracted through forcible taxation.

So there's a confusion here between the things that ought to be done and the idea that somehow government has to mandate them. I think this is a confusion of spheres between the civic or political, political sphere on the one hand and the moral or biblical sphere on the other. I'd just like to add on. What's interesting about his take is this is the same guy, if I'm correct here,

that opposed having the Ten Commandments in the classrooms. So I find that to be interesting. Oh, yeah, many of these guys, by the way, who invoke the Bible are doing it as a sort of tactical weapon against the Christians and against the evangelical Christians. They don't themselves believe it, but they use it as a cudgel against professed Christians to say, hey, listen, if you call yourself a Christian and you oppose abortion, you're morally obliged to oppose the debt penalty.

So what they do is they play this kind of biblical acrobatics, but they're doing it not from inside the text, but from outside the text. I understood. I understood. I think it's a good time to reflect on that controversial documentary 2000 meals. The reason why I want to reflect on it is because what just happened recently, the United Tulsi Gabbard, FBI agents were in Georgia. They obviously had the authority to do so.

They went in there. I guess the reporting is they were able to get some laptops and we're looking for evidence regarding the interference case that they're running. What do you have to say about what you heard in that report? And do you think there's any connection to the documentary you released in the 2000 meals? Well, let's put it this way. I don't have any doubt that there was a lot of fraud in the 2020 election. In fact, I don't have a lot of doubt that the 2020 election was rigged and stolen.

I did as much as I could in 2000 meals to make that case. But I had to stop short because the next step of that investigation requires law enforcement. It requires people to go talk to these mules, demand to know what they're doing at these dropboxes, sometimes in the middle of the night with backpacks full of ballots. Like, what are they up to? Is there some innocent explanation for what they're up to? I can't think of any, but maybe there is one. that follow-up work has never been done.

So what's happened is that there is, I think, a desperate need for catching these guys red-handed. And that's what I'm hoping that this Fulton investigation will produce, which is what we have up to now are a lot of suggestive pointers. Like, how do they all stop the count simultaneously in five states? I mean, how does that happen? Within like 10 minutes, they all stop counting. Why are they boarding up the windows, you know, if there's not some kind of hanky-panky going on? There are a lot of indications, and there's anecdotal evidence of people, you know, trying to buy votes and that sort of thing. But the judges, I think, failed us on this because they essentially refused to hear the merits of these fraud cases.

They would say things like, well, you don't have the standing to bring the case. Oh, gee, well, the election's already over. This is all kind of moot. Or, well, it's not our responsibility. This is up to the legislative process. So I think that what we're looking for, the whole country, is, look, here is a clear-cut case. And not just of, like, one guy who voted seven times, but of significant fraud. I think the Georgia election was decided by something like 12,000 votes.

So you know what? There's enough fraudulent votes here that could have made the difference in Georgia. That is, in fact, the legal standard where you put the outcome of the election in Georgia in doubt. And so I am kind of waiting with bated breath to see what this investigation uncovers. And I hope it delivers that kind of a bombshell. Yeah. One of the things my producer and I, we were looking at, there have been, and we need to We didn't have to spend much time on that. I mean, anybody can actually Google this. There have been multiple cases.

We counted four. Two in the state of Michigan where people were caught red-handed stuff in ballot boxes for their own local elections. So I don't think it's a stretch that on a national level, people were doing that. I guess the question will be, what effect did it have? And obviously, if Georgia was only decided by 12,000 votes,

I think that increases the chances there. But secondly, and maybe, I don't know if you'll appreciate this or not, but maybe there's a silver lining here because at the moment in time, Senator Thune has signaled that they might pass or get rid of the filibuster temporarily to pass the SAVE Act. Do you think there's been anything positive of what came out of the 2020 elections? Well, I think that one of the benefits of the film, 2,000 meals was simply this. Once you bust a scheme by describing it and showing it, you can't do it

again. You know, it's like if I were to show you that, guess what, they're robbing gold out of Fort Knox, and this is how they do it. They come in through the back door and they go through this elevator. Well, people know about it, and they're going to be looking for it. So at the very least, it stops that from happening in the future. I think this is one reason why the 2024 election was much better. But these fraud schemes, by the way, by the Democrats, have been going on since the 19th century. They have evolved. In the 19th century, it was things like, you know, immigrants come off the boat and there's

a bunch of Democrats waiting to meet them with a bottle of whiskey and like, you know, go see my friend, Ed, he'll give you a job. But before you go, fill out this, you know, sign this ballot form. Don't worry, we'll fill it out. I mean, this kind of stuff is not new in American history. But I think what happened under COVID is they were able to ramp up the fraud to an unprecedented degree. And so I would say that the 2020 election, far from being, this was the propaganda, you know, the most secure election in U.S. history was probably the least secure election in U.S. history

because of the various mechanisms and pathways to do the fraud. You don't have to do it one way. You can do it seven different ways. Yeah. I would also make the argument that the election was as secure as the border was. Good point. I mean, forest border, porous election, quite right. And, you know, it's the great abrogation of our institutions to allow these things to happen.

I think a lot of this, even if you look at why some of the wacky conspiracy theories that are floating around now, some by people like Candace Owens, like how did they even? get people to listen to this nonsense. Well, part of the reason is that these institutions failed us. People trusted the FBI. They realized the FBI lies to us. Trusted the National Institutes for Health. They realized that those people are doing a big cover-up of how this COVID epidemic got started. And so people have now become like, I don't know what to believe. So, you know, maybe we never landed on the moon. You know, maybe FDR at advance notice about Pearl Harbor. Who knows?

And so what's happened is we are now in a certain type of intellectual, anything goes, free fall, you can call it whatever you want. But our ability to tell what is true from what is false has become a lot more cloudy. I'm totally with you. I felt that way about the Charlie Kirk assassination. A part of me felt that it can't be as boring as some trans kid who turned violent. or believed in that movement turned violent. It's too boring for people. It's got to be something more than that.

It's got to be a country behind it. It's got to be this elaborate scheme collected with planes and surveillance and his team is in on it. At one point, you've got to stop and ask yourself, wait a minute. Does this sound like common sense? So I'm with you.

And maybe it's just because, like you're saying, a lot of the institutions, they absolutely failed this. So people are probably looking for alternative versions. Yeah, I think that's right. I think we need to keep our critical faculties actually now more than ever because we can't defer to these institutions. And so the way to look at these things is just to ask this, is there a single reliable fact that you can start with if you are going to go beyond the obvious theory? So what's the obvious theory?

The obvious theory is that you had this guy. he's not trans but he's dating this trans guy he's part of some sort of a trans network evidently these people some of them knew in advance what was going to happen because they talked about it on the discord communication so this is insidious enough and by the way very believable we know that these trans people are they're out of their mind i mean that's that's what it means to be trans they are also disposed to violence because there have been other examples of trans shootings. They have these communications. Some of them go to like military training where they do martial arts and they learn out to shoot and supposedly to defend themselves. So the connection

between the trans movement and violence is already established prior to Charlie Kirk. So there's nothing, quote, unbelievable about what we know. Also the little details are kind of telling, right? I mean, his parents turn him in. Well, I mean, that's right there a pretty damning indication of guilt. Your own parents grab you by the neck and pull you to take you down to the police station. So all of this is pretty convincing. Now, it could be more to it than that. So you have to keep an eye out to what else do we actually know? And that's the problem is I cannot put my head around a single fact that I can say, you know what? I reliably know this, and this by itself tells me that there's more to it that needs to be looked into. I'm open to being convinced of it. It's just that everything out there beyond what we know is extremely cloudy, and usually nothing more than one insinuation on top of another. So we should be reluctant to go there because this kind of thing will never end if we allow ourselves to say things like, well, this guy did it because he might have done it or he was in

town at the time. Well, that's not enough, right? You need to have motive. You need to have opportunity. How could he have done it? Where did he get the gun? So the normal kind of forensic tools that detectives routinely use to try to make a difference between a possibility and a probability, I think we just need to use the same kind of techniques here. Yeah. Yeah, people should replay what you just said on repeat, because that has not happened on social media. So going back to 2000 meals, what, I guess, shifted in your mind to go to the Dragon Prophecy. I kind of want to circle back on that, because those are totally in film, Yeah, totally different films.

So 2000 Meals was in 2022, and that same year, my wife and I in December, we went with Salem Media on a big trip to Israel. We went with 300 other people, Sebastian Gorka and I with speakers. And I was quite enchanted by Israel, in part because I felt like I'm in the land of the Bible. You know, now there are a lot of other places

that have ancient history, right? There's Rome, there's Greece. But the big difference is that in Roman Greece, those ancient civilizations are gone. There's no Roman Empire. The pyramids are gone. The ancient Greeks are not with us anymore. But in Israel, it's kind of weird because, yes, you are in an ancient civilization, but those ancient people are still around.

And they still, I mean, the women cover their heads, and they speak Hebrew, and the currency is the shekel, you know, and they celebrate the Jewish holidays. and they're praying outside the wailing wall. So the ancient times are still with us in Israel. Now, not only that, but we were exposed for the first time to this biblical archaeology, which is to me just mind-blowingly interesting. And as I encountered it, I said to myself, I don't know why this isn't being shouted from the churches of every,

from the rooftops of every church and synagogue, by the way. but I think it's because the pastors are not trained in archaeology. They're trained in theology. And the other thing is that the archaeologists, and this is kind of weird, but they're a little embarrassed about their association with the Bible. And so they will write an archaeological paper. I mean, they will literally have found the childhood home of Jesus and Nazareth, right? And you read the archaeological paper, and it doesn't say that.

It says, we found an ancient dwelling in a Jewish family. lived here and it's in the, they're Byzantine, you know, it starts going into the way that the plaster is and the mode of construction and all of that, but the biblical significance is downplayed, if not ignored completely, because the archaeologists want to be scientists, they want to be secular, they don't want to be associated with like revelation, theology, miracles. So as a result, the biblical connection, which is there, is downplayed. So this gave me the idea to want to do more about this than October 7th came along, of course, the next year. And so I thought, you know what? I've got all this riveting

October 7th footage. It's never been put out. If I can combine October 7th with biblical archaeology and a hint of biblical prophecy, I've got a really interesting film. Yeah. Yeah, I want to test the theory because you made a statement about Tucker Carlson, and he had Glenn Greenwald on his show there. And he said that if you speak to someone who defends Israel and you criticize Israel, they're going to label you a racist or a bigot. So here's a test. I believe Israel's PR is crap. I don't think they've had the best messaging. Does that make me racist? of course not uh in fact i i agree with you and not right do i agree with you but i mean it's important to realize one reason like tucker won't have me on his show i mean Tucker loves the idea of him against the jews you know so he he'd like it to be he's on one side and maybe candis and on the other side is like martlevin and ben Shapiro what he doesn't want is like christian opponents of his position because that's something he can't cope with um

Now, you know, sometimes I'll post on Israel and people will say things like, Waldenish, why are you obsessed with Israel? I'm like, I'm not. I've gone 30 years in my career without mentioning Israel. This is the first time I've actually done a film about it, and you won't find a lot about Israel in my writings. So the reason I'm talking about it now is partly in connection with the film. I just spoke, by the way, at a big anti-Semitism conference in Israel,

and I kind of challenged the premise of the whole conference because I was speaking last, by the way. I went after Ambassador Huckabee. And I said, listen, I keep hearing all day that anti-Semitism is, quote, we don't like the Jews because they're Jews. And I go, that to me doesn't make any sense. I go, let me give you a thought experiment. Let's take the state of Israel. And in my thought experiment, let's move it out of the Middle East. Let's move in another place.

Let's call it India. Let's put India where Israel is. Now, the Indians are now in Israel, and what happens is they discover that there's all this hostility coming from the region. And imagine the Indians now turn to each other, and they say, they don't like us because we're Indian. I go, no, that's not it. They don't like you because of where you're situated. They don't like you because you're right in the middle of their part of the world, which they consider to be their territory.

They don't like you because you stand for one thing and they stand for something else. They don't like you because your religion is different than theirs. In fact, from their point of view, your polytheists who worship many gods, the Hindus, I mean. From their point of view, you're pro-Western, and so you are like a little Satan sitting right there connected to the big Satan that's over in the West

and in the United States. So these are all reasons why they don't like you, but one reason that is not included is, quote, because you're Indian. So I think it is not only appropriate but healthy to raise these sorts of questions. And I don't think doing it, not a single person has called me anti-Semitic. In fact, I was speaking at a conference where people are highly alert to those things. I think that even the Jews are open to hearing this type of fresh critique.

But I think they're also a little conditioned because of history to see malice behind these things when they come from a guy like Tucker Carlson, particularly when they feel it's part of a pattern. So I agree. The actual sort of message from the Israeli government, horrible. They didn't even put on the footage of October 7th. I mean, here I am two years later, and I'm saying, I've got all this footage. I'm not the only guy who has it, but no one's put it out yet. The Israeli government is allowing all this footage to be out. A little kid is walking in the rubble of Gaza and everybody's like, oh, the poor people of Gaza. And they've all forgotten about the incident that set this off in the first place. And you, the Israeli government,

have the footage and you won't release it. What? So yes, I certainly share that kind of frustration. Yeah. And what's interesting is my other frustration regarding Israel, it has nothing really to do with Israel, is that people are so lazy. They use Israel. as this, you know, everything that's wrong with America is because of Israel, you know, or, you know, Jewish people. And it's like, what evidence exists of that exactly? And I go even a step further, and this is what I really want to get your reaction to. Okay, so they want me to believe because they've already tried with the younger generation that Israel is a threat to America because of their influence in politics. That's what they say.

When I say they can as people like that. But what about China exactly? Didn't China create a social media platform called TikTok that is literally programmed the younger generation to see things in a different way than me and you? So what is your stance on that? When Westchap first took flight in 1996, the vibes were a bit different.

People thought denim on denim was peak fashion. Inline skates were everywhere. And two out of three women rocked, the Rachel. While those things stayed in the 90s, one thing that hasn't is that fuzzy feeling you get when WestJet welcomes you on board. Here's to WestJetting since 96. Travel back in time with us

and actually travel with us at westjet.com slash 30 years. China and let's just take Qatar. Take those two countries. Those two countries have an influence on American politics far surpassing that of Israel. And in fact, it makes sense. I mean, Qatar is swimming in oil money.

China is a rich, powerful country that has got rival interest to the United States in so many areas. So why would they not do their best to shape American society, American culture, American mores? So people talk about, you know, Israel is paying some influence or $7,000. Meanwhile, Qatar is buying like the Georgetown Political Science Department, you know. So there's, you have to keep these things in perspective. Is Israel trying to influence America? Sure. But let's look at the facts. How many people are in Israel? 11 million. How many are in America? 350 million. What's the GDP of Israel compared to America? What is the weaponry of Israel compared

to America? So Israel is a little bit like an ant, and America is like an elephant. Now, you can say that the ant is ruling the elephant, but it defies a little bit of logic, right? You have to explain how is it possible for an ant to make an elephant do what it wants? No one's ever done that. They'll just darkly suggest, well, we have a back, and, you know, we've got some Jews in Hollywood, and what about Pizza Gate, and Jeffrey Epstein and, you know, Weinstein. So there's like an insinuation here, an insinuation there. And I agree, if you're asking me separately, are Jews powerful in Hollywood?

Yep. Are Jews powerful in finance? Yep. So, and there are reasons for all those things, by the way, also. And we also have to make proper distinctions. Okay, the Jews in Hollywood today are very secular and left wing. But the Jews in Hollywood in the 1940s and 50s were not. And they made a lot of the great Hollywood films that, I mean, they made films like the Ten Commandments

that we watch today with great admiration. So the old Hollywood is not the same as the new Hollywood, even though both Hollywoods were run to a large degree by Jews. So, again, I do think that some of the taboos. around these topics in past decades is part of what has created this feeling among young people that they're speaking some kind of bold truth. I agree with Elon Musk. I think we should uncork these topics, discuss them openly. I'm not afraid of them. And I think that we use truth as the best disinfectant. Yeah. Yeah, I love that. I just, I think it just like you said,

that it's going to take people to use their mental faculties. And most people don't have the patience to do that and to truly say, okay, let's not make this stretch. Let's look for actual evidence of this claim here or there. And I just think it's a huge distraction from, I mean, during COVID, we saw the, I would argue, the leverage that China has over the supply chain and that in some, they are in a sense responsible for COVID. you think that wake a lot of people up to their level of power and influence.

So this kind of brings me to a close, which is where do you see the state of our society today? And where do you think it's going to go over the next decade or so? Our greatest problems are not foreign. They're domestic. Even our problems, say, with radical Islam is made much more serious by the fact that you've got the so-called red green line. In other words, the cultural left in America and in the West is importing radical Islam, is treating radical Islam as just another constituencies. And so if the United States didn't have its domestic problems,

international problems would be much, much less. Now, we've been talking about influence. So my son-in-law is a congressman, and it's given me in the short time the year or so, he's been in office, great insight into how these. congressmen and senators are so vulnerable to the power of lobbies. Now, sure, there is a Israel lobby, but the Israel lobby is like minuscule compared to, say, the defense lobby. So the defense lobby is huge. Then look at other domestic lobbies, the food lobby, the pharmaceutical lobby. And so you're a typical congressman. And in your own district, you've got to really go and

eat rubber chicken to get some guy to give you 50 bucks or 100 bucks. And then you go to Washington, D.C., and, you know, Lockheed will give you a million dollars. And Pfizer will give you a million dollars if you vote their way. And so what's happening is when we talk about influence, you know, we are right to focus on foreign influence, but we also need to recognize that there are giant industries in the United States that are not motivated by the good of the country. Or to put it differently, their lobbyists would say, what's good for Pfizer is good for America. What's good for Lockheed is good for America. They equate their own private benefit with somehow the welfare of the country.

And what I mean is our whole political system, our whole democratic system is vulnerable to this. And it's not a problem that either Republicans or Democrats know how to solve. It's also a major reason why the country isn't so much debt. It's a major reason why we are heading toward a precipice of bankruptcy. It's because ultimately the taxpayer has become, you know, the looting of the taxpayer is become big business in America. And that's something I think we're going to have to deal with. And I'm not quite sure how. Yeah.

I don't know the answer to that either, but I will back up what you're saying there. Isn't it fascinating that the Department of Defense, when their budget comes up, up. It's passed. Maybe one person will vote. No. There's literally no drama, no fight, no public statements. It just gets passed. But everything else, oh, it's like pulling teeth. So you're right about how powerful the lobbies are for the military, that is. Okay, so why don't you leave us with this? One of your happiest moments in your life. You've had a lot of success, clearly. share one of those moments with us. Well, there are private moments.

I'm in a really happy marriage. I've got two beautiful grandchildren, so I'm experiencing the new joys of grandparenthood, and that is awesome. I still have a tremendous sense of wonder about America, which I first really saw when I was 17 years old, I haven't lost that sort of sense, almost a childhood sense, of stepping into a new place and wanting to be a part of it. But in a spiritual sense, I also feel that way about Israel.

Israel is not my country. I was born in India. I'm now an American. But Israel is a little bit of a spiritual homeland. And by that, I mean, I feel more connected to God and to the Bible in that place, visually, experientially. And, you know, remember, because I'm a film guy, I look at things cinematically. Israel is just like the Ten Commandments, the film, will I come to life? And so what I like to do is to take these experiences of wonder,

but then combine them with some disciplined work and scholarship and painstaking, movie making, to present these ideas in a way that people will find relevant, exciting, and illuminating. Yeah, I love that. Well, the one and only, and I mean the only one, Dinesh D'Souza. Excuse me. Thank you again for joining the show today.

Very grateful for your time and your story. And I love how you left this off with a positive note and being optimistic. Very, very grateful for you, sir. I appreciate it. Thank you. Absolutely.